The invention relates to a method and device for the mechanical stitching of multipart printing products by means of wire staples, in which the products are transported forwards continuously by a conveyer and a wire staple is driven in by a stitching head with a displaceably guided staple-driver.
For manufacturing laterally wire-stitched multi-quire paper covers in flowlines, use is made of side-stitching units as a component interlinked with a collating machine and an adhesive binding machine. Loose quires collated to form stacks are transferred into an upright position via a setting-up track and arrive, standing on their backs, in a connecting conveyer system with side-stitching units. These are equipped with two or four stitching heads with associated bending-over devices and are located, for the purpose of introducing the wire staples during the continuous transport of the products, on longitudinally displaceable, synchronously following carriages. For the purpose of sticking wire staples into thick products on both sides, additional stitching heads may be provided on the opposite side of the path of movement of the stacks of quires. The quires which are connected to form a block by laterally introduced wire staples are fed, as the process continues, to the adhesive binding machine for gluing the back and/or the side regions and for casing the block into a cover.
Paper covers saddle-stitched with wire, such as magazines, are produced in so-called “saddle-stitching flowlines” on gathering wire-stitching machines with the aid of a roof-shaped stitching-goods carrier with entrainment means on a continuously running gathering chain which engage behind the products, and with two or more stitching heads and associated bending-over devices for introducing wire staples through the back-margin fold and bending over the legs of the wire staples from inside. The stitching heads with the bending-over devices are located, just as in the case of lateral wire-stitching, on carriages which follow at the same speed. An example of a gathering wire-stitching machine of this kind is known from German Patent Specification 34 43 376.
The known block wire-stitching machines and gathering wire-stitching machines with stitching heads mounted in an overhung manner for use in flowlines require an extremely high outlay in terms of construction and are therefore very cost-intensive. Because of the masses which have to be moved, constituted by the carriage with the stitching heads, further limits are imposed on increases in performance. Moreover, stitching machines with carriages which are constantly moved to and fro are subject to major wear and also make not inconsiderable demands in terms of space.